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itwbennett writes "Responding to questions from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence yesterday, Matthew Olsen, the NSA's general counsel, said that the NSA 'may', under 'certain circumstances' have the authority to track U.S. citizens by intercepting location data from cell phones, but it's 'very complicated.' 'There's no need to panic, or start shopping for aluminum-foil headwear,' says blogger Kevin Fogarty, but clearly the NSA has been thinking about it enough 'that the agency's chief lawyer was able to speak intelligently about it off the cuff while interviewing for a different job.'"

"Very complicated", referring of course to the process of determining whether your political leanings are threatening or not to the government in power.

Possibly, but you have to understand that "the government in power" in this case isn't Obama, or Bush, or Congress, but instead the TLAs and their massive and growing secret activities. It doesn't matter, for instance, that they've knowingly and repeatedly violated the law - both the Attorney General and the federal courts have said, in short, "Regardless of whether the agency broke the law, you can't talk about it in an open courtroom. Case dismissed."

I'm going to also assume they've acquired dirt on most of Congress as well as the President and most presidential candidates, as a way to prevent their funding from being taken.

There's also a lot of ideological lag. Remember Chaplin was harrassed and even framed at great expense to the taxpayer in the 1950s because he was an outspoken anti-fascist. There's something truly comical about security agencies pretending that a millionaire hollywood studio owner was a communist and then having to change tack before everyone laughed them out of a job.

You are quite mistaken if you think every major player does it. Qwest got in trouble two years ago for NOT doing it. Cox here in the southwest at least is the same way. Few other carriers are as large as ATT so its quite impractical for most other players to do it. Verizon and ATT probably do it but anyone else I doubt it. Time Warner might be in on it but it's mostly the old telcos that are working with the government rather than the old cable companies.

There's no need to panic: First lie.that the agency's chief lawyer was able to speak intelligently about it...: Second lie. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Biggest lie of all, intelligence in the Senate, individually, committee-wise or otherwise.

Not to Godwin my post, but I'm hoping we're not heading into a Weimar Republic here. Congress is getting so dysfunctional that we're in danger of enough people deciding that we need One Leader simply to get things done.

Because the mission of the NSA isn't law enforcement, and it's a bit chilling to know that the spy agency that is more secretive than the CIA is actually pointing their sights at American citizens, which is NOT what they're supposed to be doing.

Unless those people are in communication with people outside the country, in which case they (the domestic phone users) are one half of the call and tracking that is precisely what they're supposed to be doing.

Have you ever actually used any sort of communications device? Perhaps a telephone, maybe? Never mind. It's not possible that you're that ignorant of how the systems involved actually work, so you're just trolling.

Because the mission of the NSA isn't law enforcement, and it's a bit chilling to know that the spy agency that is more secretive than the CIA is actually pointing their sights at American citizens, which is NOT what they're supposed to be doing.

Why, because no American citizen could possibly prove a threat to national security? And no one in the US could be communicating with foreign spies? You seem to have a very naive view of the world.

As long as the circumstances are "when we have a warrant", then I don't see an issue.

I do. NSA was chartered for the purpose of gathering electronic intelligence of our enemies abroad (at the time of its inception, the Soviet Union). I worked at NSA in the late '80s, and at the time, there were signs posted all over warning that NSA was specifically prohibited by executive order from conducting surveillance on U.S. citizens within the United States. The FBI is tasked with domestic law enforcement, not NSA; NSA has no business whatsoever conducting surveillance on American citizens within the U.S.

I do. NSA was chartered for the purpose of gathering electronic intelligence of our enemies abroad (at the time of its inception, the Soviet Union). I worked at NSA in the late '80s, and at the time, there were signs posted all over warning that NSA was specifically prohibited by executive order from conducting surveillance on U.S. citizens within the United States. The FBI is tasked with domestic law enforcement, not NSA; NSA has no business whatsoever conducting surveillance on American citizens within th

So if a terrorist had phoned Mr A in New York on the day of September 11 saying "congratulations on the bomb thing, now on to phase two" you don't think that any subsequent calls to/from Mr A should have been monitored?
And whether it's by the FBI or the NSA is just nit-picking.

So if a terrorist had phoned Mr A in New York on the day of September 11 saying "congratulations on the bomb thing, now on to phase two" you don't think that any subsequent calls to/from Mr A should have been monitored?

In the general case, I don't think NSA should have had any clue that your hypothetical terrorist had called Mr. A. However, if they intercepted the call while the hypothetical terrorist was already being surveilled for another reason, then the proper response would have been to disclose to the FBI that Mr. A might possibly be connected with a terrorist organization so that the FBI could get a warrant to conduct an investigation legally and properly.

It's like in the final season of 24, when Jack Bauer was on the run from the government, he bought about a dozen cell phones. Every time he made a phone call he would immediately throw the phone in a bin.

I'm hardly going to debate the ethics or constitutionality or whatever of this, because to the following, it's irrelevant:

If you care about your privacy that much, why are you willingly carrying around a device that's transmitting your position with little or no encryption to everyone who wants to see it? If you want to secure your network, do you leave an open WAP transmitting its SSID as widely as possible? This isn't someone planting a tracking device. This is you shouting loudly to everyone that you're here, and then complaining when someone takes note.

By extension, I shouldn't use a phone ever, because the person on the other end will almost certainly be vulnerable to tracking and eavesdropping.

We shouldn't have to spend our days attempting to cloak ourselves from our own government agencies. The ability of certain agencies to use GPS tracking has saved plenty of lives through helping to locate victims during rescue efforts, and that's just one worthwhile use. We shouldn't have to sacrifice that just to keep gratuitous government eavesdropping at bay. Th

When you're walking around the street talking to your significant other, although in public, you don't necessarily want someone to follow you around, take notes of what you're saying and keep track of where you've been.

Cellphone or not, just because someone can track you and listen in to your conversations easily, it doesn't mean that you've given them permission to or that they should do it on a whim.

I'm hardly going to debate the ethics or constitutionality or whatever of this, because to the following, it's irrelevant:

If you care about your privacy that much, why are you willingly carrying around a device that's transmitting your position with little or no encryption to everyone who wants to see it? If you want to secure your network, do you leave an open WAP transmitting its SSID as widely as possible? This isn't someone planting a tracking device. This is you shouting loudly to everyone that you're here, and then complaining when someone takes note.

um, ya, don't you see all the peeps bitching about the wifi info google gathered? bunch of stupid ass consumers out there.

so a smart villain must have a smartphone, it's a honey-pot see? And can be used to establish innocence to boot. All your important communiques are ported through custom android software that does encrypted VOIP over wifi because you are a mega villain with resources, but why not have the best of both worlds? If you you KNOW your adversary is tapping you - you provide disinformation. This furor about smartphones is a tax against the ignorant, effective, but limited.

Any competent criminal MUST have a smartphone, it's a honey-pot see? It can be used to establish innocence. All your important communiques are ported through custom android software that does encrypted VOIP over wifi because you are a mega villain with resources, right? But why not have the best of both worlds? If you you KNOW your adversary is tapping you - you provide disinformation. This furor about smartphones is a tax against the ignorant, effective, but limited.

Ever since ECHELON chatter started 10-12 years ago, does anyone really think that the UK–USA Security Agreement nations hasn't been doing this?

The problem is that it'd be hard to track everyone at once, even with super computers and satellites like LACROSSE there are just too many people to track, so they can probably actively track a few thousand to a million people.

If they want to look up where anyone else is, they can hit phone location, email IP, social media logs, international and domestic flig

The problem is that it'd be hard to track everyone at once, even with super computers and satellites like LACROSSE there are just too many people to track, so they can probably actively track a few thousand to a million people.

So what happens when the technology advances to the point where it is no more difficult to track the entire population of the U.S.? It's a logical fallacy to claim it's no big deal just because it's impractical given current technology. Technology will catch up, but if you wait until it does to object, it will be too late.

Precisely. I'm pretty sure that the tech to do so is reasonably priced now, for something with a budget like the NSA. What's the data bandwidth needed per person to track- cell-related movements?- voice calls (full audio)?

We already believe the NSA is doing the latter, and the former is likely less bits/sec, possibly by an order of magnitude or two. So, whatever datacenter in which they store the voice calls likely has a nice little partition or database where they can store any geolocation related things

The problem is that it'd be hard to track everyone at once, even with super computers and satellites like LACROSSE there are just too many people to track, so they can probably actively track a few thousand to a million people.

This is true. I expect that machines are sifting as fast as they can, and people are rapidly eyeballing the results (or listening to audio keyword excerpts at high speed) for human judgements. Something like what Phil Dick described in A Scanner Darkly.

I watched "The Adjustment Bureau" recently, and they have a similar statement, although their "watchers/adjusters" were more supernatural than our (current) overlords. I liked that meme in the movie; however, your other responder is correct: technology will advance to a point where it is possible to watch everyone, 24/7, audio/video/multiple angles -- "and then there was nobody left to speak for me."

And any of this matters how? Historically, all of the collective of government spy agencies (USA, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand), has made sharing of information opaque. Its not a 'request for information on a form', its a fat pipe 24/7/365 data stream. Now all of these countries have governments that strictly forbid that these agencies do not spy on the country they are in: The NSA does not spy on citizens within the United States, the GCHQ does not spy on citizens within the UK, the CSE does not s

Why is it either a surprise or a scare that the NSA can, with what is bound to be much higher standards for justification (as long as the Republicans aren't in the White House, in which case justification involves merely setting up plausible deniability)?

As long as a Republican isn't in the White House? I suppose you have read all the new NSA directives since Obama has been in office that have upped the standard? Or are you referring to that time Obama signed the extension of the Patriot Act. Definitely higher standards there.

Its the same from both sides, don't obscure the truth that the gov in general is running around destroying privacy and other rights while people fight about what side of some random carpeted aisle the idea came from...

Yeah, I'm thinking of starting an organization, perhaps to be named "Fuck you, esse!" to hit both the Mexican drug war started by US policies, and also for the inverse LXPK-type reference. Anyway, the idea is this: produce devices that communicate with other devices, over whatever fucking infrastructure, with the communications being uninterceptable. Then, either laugh all the way to the bank -- or to the wrong side of the grass. (Which is why I'm no longer thinking of starting it.)

Anyone within the intelligence community could have been able to "speak intelligently about it off the cuff'. It is clearly spelled out in Executive Order 12333 [archives.gov]. Everyone within the intelligence community is given yearly reinforcement training on it.

The most important part that is emphasized during the training is that the US Intelligence Community cannot collect or maintain intelligence information on US citizens or those assumed to be US citizens (anyone physically in the US is considered a US citize

That 99% of the intelligence gathering community is following the law to the letter is wonderful, but does not account for the damage that the 1% that are not following the law are doing. In so far as when things tend to go wrong, they go wrong catastrophically, you only need one agent in charge of important information to completely destroy the reason for having the agency in the first place. It's essentially a form of asymmetric warfare.

There are so many laws in the states these days, it's impossible to know for certain you haven't done anything illegal. If someone watches you for long enough, they WILL find something to nail your ass to the ground for.

"There are certain circumstances where that authority may exist," even if the NSA has no warrant to investigate a the [sic] person whose privacy it is invading or global permission to eavesdrop on everyone, according to Matthew Olsen, the NSA's general counsel.